Like most people, I have friend and family members that have tried to quit smoking. I’ve seen the gum, I’ve seen patches of every shape and size, and I have seen most of them not work. At the end of the day, there’s a social component to smoking that can’t really be avoided once you are in an environment with other smokers. In order to get away from smoking, I think you need to continue the social process until your body doesn’t want the nicotine anymore.

An increasingly common technique I have recently experienced is the electronic cigarette. Not only are basic versions of this tech starting to hit shelves of convenience stores all over, but they are starting to show up at relatively reasonable prices. Naturally, there are also kits out there for more advanced nicotine enthusiasts, and I had the opportunity to look deep into this brave new world recently.

How do they work?

Most e-cigs work the same way. There’s an “e-liquid” that hits a vaporizer, and when you inhale on one end of the stick you receive the nicotine-laced vapor. As you inhale, your lungs will respond in much the same way as a regular cigarette. You will feel the vapor in your lungs, and you will absorb the nicotine the same way. When you exhale, you will see some of the leftover vapor before it fades away. If you’re lucky, or just a bad smoker, the vapor might even have some of the scent left over from the flavor you just inhaled.

The most common way to purchase these cigarettes is from your local convenience store. These kits are usually disposable, and all-in-one kits that give you the vapor experience without having to spend a lot all at once. Unfortunately, even if you are clever enough to make these last awhile, they are still only marginally cheaper than normal cigarettes. You still buy them by the pack, and there’s very little room for modification or improvements since they are disposable. Still, they work, and if your goal is to quit smoking altogether, these over the counter disposables are certainly worth trying. If you have are considering using the technology to help you quit, you might consider a more custom solution.

Many different companies right now make kits that allow you to vaporize your nicotine using more advanced kits. Unlike the disposables, these kits break down into individual replaceable pieces that allow you to customize your smoking experience. These kits can include things like larger batteries, increased vapor delivery, even so much as direct control over how many volts your battery is discharging to your atomizer. There’s a lot of customization allowed, and there are websites all over that are dedicated to selling individual parts for building your own smoking kit.

Building your own electronic cigarette

Every e-cigarette is made of roughly the same bits. You have a power supply, an atomizer, and the mouthpiece. Each of these three pieces can be heavily customized, or you can just buy an all in one kit that gets the job done. Most of these kits start at around $50, and gives you everything you need to get started. Many users start with these kits and then purchase replacement parts that enhance one or more parts of the device.

Arguably the most important part of an e-cig is the power supply. Since you are only walking around with one of these, it’s important that you have a battery that is actually going to keep up with you all day. Most kits start with a 500 or 750mAh battery, but offer 1000mAh battery upgrades. The more mAh you have, the larger your battery is. Like everything else, the size of your battery also increases the overall weight of the electronic cigarette. Each battery also includes the circuitry needed to turn the device on and off, as well as activate the atomizer when you are ready to smoke. More advanced batteries include the ability to control how many volts your battery is sending to the atomizer. Voltage control allows the atomizer to burn at a higher or lower rate, which affects how much vapor is delivered when you inhale.

The piece that does all the hard work is called an atomizer. I have yet to get a straight answer when I asked why this piece wasn’t called a vaporizer, but it seemed like a small thing to argue about. This device’s job is to heat up and turn the liquid surrounding it into vapor. The atomizer is the first piece on an e-cig to need to be replaces, as it fails due to overuse or a lack of cleaning. These pieces are inexpensive to replace, and on average need to replaced every few months.

The mouthpiece of any e-cig is different based on how you decide to use the device. There are cartridges, which are usually plastic tips that you stick right on top of the atomizer. These are usually filled with liquid and a wick. The liquid dips on the atomizer gradually, and you just replace the disposable cartridge when it is empty. If you don’t want to deal with disposable cartridges, there are mouthpieces that allow you to drip liquid on the atomizer manually. This allows you to change flavors quickly, but usually requires that you carry a bottle of liquid with you for when you need to refill.

If you plan to stick with a specific flavor, and you don’t want to carry around a bottle, there are combination mouthpieces that allow you to attach a tank of liquid to the E-Cig. These are usually referred to as cartomizers or clearomizers, and they combine the cartridge and the atomizer into a single replaceable unit. You can fill these with whatever liquid you choose, and most users claim you only need to refill every three or four days based on regular daily use.

Nicotine carrying e-liquid

The thing I find most interesting about anyone currently using e-cigarettes is the volume of faith that these users have in producers and resellers. Most of these websites are far from professional seeming, and more than a few of them come off as digital head shops. With each place that sells the devices, there are a couple of places that sell the liquid you put in them. These websites don’t explain much about what goes in to the product they are making, aside from the name of the flavor and the amount of nicotine that goes into them.

After a little research, I learned that these liquids are made of propylene glycol and vegetable glycerin with both nicotine and flavoring added in. On some websites, you can request how much of these materials you would like in your bottle of liquid.

If your goal is to replace your normal cigarettes, you can adjust the ratios of propylene glycol and vegetable glycerin in your orders. The different ratios of liquid affect how much smoke is produced by the atomizer, as well as where in your body the nicotine absorption starts. More vegetable glycerine means more smoke, while more propylene glycol means absorption starts at the throat instead of the lungs. If your goal is to quit smoking, there’s a very simple way to accomplish this with the liquid you purchase: most websites allow you to choose how much nicotine is in the batch you order. If you want to quit, you step down how much nicotine is in your batch gradually, until you reach zero.

There’s also no limit to what flavors you can get access to. I’ve seen everything from a cinnamon bun to Red Bull, as well as knockoffs of popular cigarette brands. Nobody is really willing to discuss what they do to achieve these flavors, usually claiming that they are concerned the competition might steal the recipe. I would say that it makes me uncomfortable not knowing what I am inhaling, but it occurs to me that most people smoking normal cigarettes have no idea what they are inhaling either.

Do they solve problems for smokers?

At the end of the day, the biggest drive to e-smoking right now is the hope that it will be cheaper to smoke this way than the more conventional methods. When an average pack of cigarettes cost $7-8, it’s not that hard to imagine why there are so many people looking for alternatives. In my research I found that basic kits ran about $50. Replacing the atomizer every couple of months runs about $10, and replacement batteries about once a year start at about $25, depending on what size you get. The liquid costs on average about $0.75/ml and is sold in a variety of sizes. If you are a “pack a day” smoker, 15ml will last you about two weeks. Basically, you’ll break even in about six weeks, unless you decide to start customizing your device.

The critical component to the technology is the ability to gradually quit smoking without removing yourself from the social experience and physical actions that many smokers associate with their habit. You can control how you step down, and I have met several people recently that have found it very easy to make it to 0 mg of nicotine in their e-cigs within a few months.